I just ordered a Pino Digital Pro electric kettle. After a LOT of research and consideration I decided to order this kettle over all the others available online as it looks to be the most promising and has everything I want in an electric kettle. (The only other kettles that really had my interest was the Kamjove kettles.) I will be posting an ongoing review of it (along with pictures) after it arrives.

I have that Pino, and like it so much that I have two of them--one for home, and one for the office. I like it so well, in fact, that I'm seriously considering getting another one for a satellite office that I spend about three days a month working in. I've been working with a simple boil/shutoff type electric kettle and a thermometer and while it's fine for the bulk brewing for the thermos, it's not nearly as pleasant as the Pino for gongfu cha in the evening with paperwork.

That's my intended purpose for the Pino. Gongfu cha is my main hobby lately and I feel that an electric kettle would really make it a lot more pleasant. Also I want the kettle so that I can make tea in any room rather than just the kitchen. Good to know someone else has had a good experience with one. I made my decision on getting it after I saw a bunch of videos of tea shop owners using it during gongfu cha.

Ah, somehow in the month (roughly) since I started reading on TC I never came across any comments on it. Well I'm glad I made a good choice, a lot of it was just based on what the company and a couple dozen reviews on Amazon said. Good to know there are members of the tea community that enjoy it though. I can't wait for it to get here!

Did you have the same problems with the water measuring device that I've read all over the reviews on Amazon? (It's flimsy, it falls out, etc.) Most of the reviewers said they either immediately removed it or removed it after struggling to keep it in the kettle for a while. Just curious, I don't really care as I make tea almost exclusively gongfu and don't really need specific amounts of water.

I have only had one come off/out once, when I was rinsing it out after descaling with some vinegar because I have fairly hard water. It was easy to replace. I like it because I generally want at least a liter of water for a session of tea to fill my quart thermos. I also want to start gongfu with a similar amount in order to not reach the point where the water is so low that the temperature gets very unstable before the tea is done.

That's interesting. I'm beginning to think that only the people that have issues with products posts reviews on Amazon. I also have very hard water here, but the water I use for my tea doesn't really scale up my current kettle. What is your process for descaling the Pino? Do you just let vinegar soak in it? Someone on one of the reviews said they just boiled water with lemon juice in it and that cleared up the scaling really well.

FYI, just reporting back that my first Pino kettle is dysfunctional and on it's way to the scrap heap: I think this is the first one that I bought four years ago. Its problem is that it is no longer measuring temperature properly--not a good thing in a kettle sold with temperature precision as the entire point. I had noticed in the last month or two that I was filling it more often than usual, and saw some new condensation on the walls & ceiling around the tea preparation area, and it seemed to spend a lot of time with rapidly boiling water even when set for 180s or 190s and not 205 (all degrees F). So I've been checking temps with an infrared thermometer--the water in the kettle and the interior walls of the kettle--and it's been 208+ while the water was bubbling away and the kettle's digital display was showing 190. This kettle does get a lot of use, several hours a day on weekends alone; and has been tossed in a suitcase a number of times for travel, conditions that could easily lead to loosening of a connection someplace; and there might be a bit of coating on the base element that is making the connection from base unit to teapot a bit iffy, some corrosion or hard water deposits.

I have no such issues with the other two pots from the same manufacturer, but I will take advantage of this problem to try out a Bonavita gooseneck kettle and compare.

Even with this kettle failing, it seems the Pinos have been good to you. Thus, I'm looking forward to hearing your thoughts and experience with the new Bonavita when it comes. Nice to have justification for some new teaware!